Chapter 3

Bonfires blazed in the royal court of Nanyue. Cups passed from hand to hand around the banquet tables.

I was led into the center of the feast.

The harsh smells of strong liquor and roasted meat struck me.

The men at the tables stared openly, making no attempt to hide how they were inspecting and assessing me.

Through the noise, I caught snatches of their remarks.

“Look at our new queen!”

“Han women really do have such delicate skin!”

“Your Majesty, is this beauty to your liking?”

One gaze cut through the clamor and settled heavily upon me.

I looked up.

The man in the seat of honor had features that seemed hewn from stone, deep-set eyes and a high nose, quite unlike a Han man’s.

This was Yuan Xiu, the King of Nanyue.

My husband.

And the man responsible for bringing disaster to the border and driving its people from their homes.

For an instant, I seemed to see Xie Wuyang licking blood from the corner of his mouth as he charged desperately at the enemy.

Then I seemed to see the tasseled spear fall from his hand.

Countless blades piercing him from every side.

Yuan Xiu lounged against his throne, turning an old whistle between his fingers. His indifferent gaze treated me as an object of no consequence.

The whistle was pale and clean all over. I could not help looking at it a little longer.

Yuan Xiu noticed.

He toyed with it. “Do you like it? I made it from a prisoner from your Great Zhou during the war. A fair-skinned fellow. The whistle carved from him came out just as white.”

“I remember that young soldier kept murmuring ‘Ah Nian, Ah Nian’ while I stripped his bones… Pity he wasn’t one of my Nanyue men. He had to die!”

My mother had named me when I was born.

Chen Nian, with her surname.

Xie Wuyang said it was an ugly name.

He said all that longing would drive me mad one day.

So, having made up his mind, he changed my name to Xie Wunian: no longing at all.

“Now you’ve got the same generation name as me. You should count yourself lucky!”

Naturally, his mother, Madam Xie, sent him flying ten li with a kick.

She said he had read too many martial-arts tales and was still dreaming of a hero’s life, robbing the rich to help the poor.

But she agreed that Chen Nian was not a good name, and before long she had given me another.

Xie Qingshi.

“You’re living in Qingshi now. You might as well be called Xie Qingshi.”

Well…

This time Xie Wuyang objected. They argued for ages before settling on a compromise: he would call me Wunian, and Madam Xie would call me Qingshi.

I had three names.

Life in Qingshi was hardly prosperous. We barely scraped by. Years of fighting in the surrounding country made business at Madam Xie’s tavern worse and worse.

She often sat sighing at the mouth of the alley. Even our everyday meals grew plainer.

Xie Wuyang hated seeing me so thin and was always going into the hills to catch game for me.

Fragrant roast rabbit. Crisp-skinned pheasant with juices running at the first bite.

He said being taken in to become his bride was already unfair enough to me. He would never let me suffer or go hungry.

“Ah Nian, when we get married, I’ll buy you a bright red wedding gown and the finest phoenix crown. I’ll bring you home in grand style!”

By then, though, almost every wooden stool in the tavern had been pawned.

Then news reached town that the court was recruiting. Anyone who enlisted would receive ten taels of silver.

Ten taels was a year’s earnings for the tavern.

Xie Wuyang knelt before Madam Xie and begged for her consent.

Late on the night before he left, he took me to sit on a haystack and told me he would be back soon. Once the fighting ended, he would return to marry me properly.

The stars wheeled overhead that night, making my head spin.

Xie Wuyang had not lied to me.

Three months later, I saw him.

In the bone whistle made from his body.